


Finding out

by Maracuya



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, First Time, Near canon future
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-01
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-29 10:49:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5124734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maracuya/pseuds/Maracuya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is set directly after Brienne and Jaime have met again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Finding out

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SassyEggs](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SassyEggs/gifts).



> I don't own anything. This is all Grrm's world and characters, and I'm just playing with them without seeking any profit.
> 
> The story was triggered off in a thread on LJ: http://asoiaf-talking.livejournal.com/24853.html#comments.

The wench looked uglier than before, what with her scarred cheek where a piece of the flesh was missing and those strangulation marks around her neck. She barely said anything – but when she did, her grating voice worried him. But worst of all was that the light had gone out in those beautiful blue eyes of hers.

 

Jaime wondered what had happened to Brienne. He noticed her tense shoulders. The way she wouldn't look at him. She didn't even react to his teasing japes, which was probably the worst sign.

  
_“Something has gone horribly wrong with her. She looks on the outside like I did on the inside in those moments when I had to decide between my oath and honour, my king... and Kings Landing.”_

  
The big problem was: how on earth should he find out the truth?

  
_“I need to unsettle her,”_ he thought and found it a reasonable idea, so he pondered his options all afternoon.

 

In the evening, when they had made camp and were looking into the flames of their crackling fire, Jaime spoke up: “Wench, there's something I'd like to ask you.”

  
“Yes?”

  
For a split second, she looked at him, but she averted her gaze again.

  
Jaime cleared his throat.

  
“Wench, these are dangerous times, and you and I, we may die at any moment. We never know what's around the next corner...”

  
Brienne swallowed.

  
“... and there's one thing I'd like to find out before I go meet the Stranger. That much I've realised over the last weeks.”

 

Brienne shot him another side glance and frowned.

  
“And that is?”

  
Jaime smirked, but he knew the smile didn't reach his eyes.

  
“I'd like to have known another woman before my death. Not just Cersei. Would you do me the favour? I know it's a big thing I'm asking, it's just...”

  
He shrugged.

 

Brienne gaped at him.

  
“You're not serious! You could have had any woman! All those beautiful ladies at court!” she exclaimed.

  
Jaime snorted.

  
“I shit on them and their beauty. I'd prefer you on any given day.”

 

The wench started to tremble.

  
So Jaime asked: “Are you afraid of me? Or of... it? I won't have you do something you don't want to – “

  
“I'll do it,” Brienne cut in and coughed.

 

“Are you sure?” Jaime asked.

  
The wench nodded.

  
“When? Where?”

  
“Uhhhh... now?”

 

Finally, Brienne looked at him, and there was such pain in her eyes that Jaime wanted to wrap his arms around her and to carry her away, into a happy future, like a true nobleman. But real life didn't hold any such options, he knew.

 

When he kissed Brienne for the first time, he understood why he hadn't obeyed, not even answered Cersei's letter; why he had been deaf to his sister's plea to come back to the capital.

  
The wench reacted to him, shyly at first. Within two or three minutes, however, she kissed him back and crashed her lips and teeth against his own ones with an incredible hunger. As if she wanted to eat him up in despair.

  
With feverish hands, she opened his clothes, and her own ones, too.

 

For a moment, Jaime feared his cock might fail him from lack of usage in the recent past, or because this wasn't Cersei.

  
He needn't have worried.

 

If Brienne was afraid of what was about to happen, she didn't show it – or even camouflaged it with wild enthusiasm. Jaime wanted to prepare her better, but his wench didn't allow it and pressed herself down on him.

  
Her face distorted for a moment when he took her maidenhood, but she didn't stop.

  
_“How wonderful she is,”_ Jaime thought and moaned. _“I've been so stupid not to make her mine at once.”_

  
He allowed her to take the lead, and Brienne was a real force of nature.

 

After a while, Jaime couldn't hold back any more and peaked. After that, they lay together, and he held Brienne close. She pressed her face against his shoulder, still taut as a bowstring, and wouldn't let go of him.

  
After an hour or so, Jaime felt new arousal and didn't know what to do. But Brienne answered his unspoken question by starting to move again.

 

Their second time was no less passionate than the first one, much to Jaime's surprise. When he had finished, he used the fingers of his left hand to help her on the way, too. He was nowhere near as deft as he would have been with his right one, and he cursed himself. Notwithstanding, after a while he managed to bring his wench fulfillment, too.

 

Then, Brienne started to sob, and all the grief that had been buried inside her, broke free.

  
“Jaime,” she blubbered, “Jaime, you mustn't stay here. They'll find you.”

 

He cupped Brienne's cheek.

  
“Who will find me, wench?” he asked and dreaded the answer.

  
“The Brotherhood Without Banners. Lady Stoneheart. She wants to hang you. She has demanded you in exchange for Podrick and Ser Hyle.”

 

Had the Mountain, Gregor Clegane, struck him with a mailed fist, Jaime could have not felt worse. Finally, he understood the dilemma Brienne was in. He had heard enough about Lady Stoneheart to know the undead hag would show no mercy. Countless dead Freys proved it true.

  
“What happened?” he asked, keeping his voice soft, despite his surging fear and his anger.

 

In between sobs and hiccups, Brienne related her story, of how they had been caught and half hanged, and of how she had managed to strike a pact with Lady Stoneheart: Ser Hyle's and Podrick's lives for Jaime's.

  
“Pleasepleaseplease,” Brienne begged. “Go. Leave now. It's not too late.”

 

“Ssssht.”

  
Jaime pressed his finger onto the wench's full lips, and he understood what he had to do.

  
_“It's a cruel prize I have to pay for all my sins – but perhaps it's a just one.”_

  
Aloud, he said: “You were right to fetch me. Podrick is a good boy. And young. I can't say much about the other one, but my brother's former squire deserves to live. That much I know.”

 

Brienne's red-rimmed eyes widened.

  
“You're going to sacrifice yourself!? No! No! You mustn't do that! Don't try to be a honourable hero now, of all moments!”

 

Jaime kissed her, and this time, he was incredibly tender. He thought he had never been so tender in his life.

  
“Poor wench,” he murmured. “What did this horrible woman do to you? How could she force you into such a situation?”

  
Brienne beseeched him to run away, even tried to drag him away, but strong as she was, she still wasn't able to get far with a grown man like him.

  
“Wench,” Jaime growled, “I'm a warrior. I've faced death dozens of times, and I've learned to live with the knowledge my time here isn't endless. I could have died a hundred dirty deaths on the battlefield, and I've always known I wouldn't pass away as an old dodderer who can't keep his urine anymore. I rather prefer to die this way and to save Pod. And perhaps I'll save my soul, too, who knows? Valar Morghulis.”

 

“Don't get philosophical now, you stupid, stubborn lion!” Brienne sobbed. “What if I'm with child? With your child?”

  
Jaime gazed at the tall warrior woman.

  
“In case you survive this mad war – raise him or her so as to become a proud person, and a good fighter. If he or she comes after you, I'd be the happiest man in the afterlife.”

  
In response to this, Brienne thrashed her fists against his ribcage.

  
“Jaime! Jaime, please –”

 

“Brienne of Tarth?” another dark voice spoke in the dark. “And the Kingslayer?”

  
“Aaaaah,” Jaimed said and smirked. “Here comes my escort to go and meet the Stranger, if I'm not mistaken. Good evening, gentlemen. Or good morning. Whatever you prefer.”

  
A hand slapped Jaime across the mouth, and he tasted blood. There were more voices to be heard in the background.

  
Brienne screamed.

 

“Someone take that warrior slut away, she doesn't need to see this,” the first man said.

  
“Her name is Brienne,” Jaime growled. “Is your memory so short you can't use her proper name?”

  
He was struck again, and a tooth or two felt loose afterwards. Not that it mattered that his legendary handsomeness was suffering now, at the end.

  
He managed to shout after Brienne, who was being dragged away by no less than three grown men: “Do me a favour wench: stay alive and good and true to yourself. This is my decision, not your fault. And thank you for everything.”

  
It was all he could do now: to alleviate her bad conscience.

  
“JAIMEEEE!”

 

The call tore at his heart.

  
_“That's my problem, apart from being arrogant: I've always loved too much,”_ he thought.

  
For a moment, he thought of Cersei and his children. The children he had never been allowed to be a father for. Then, his thoughts returned to his wench – and to the possibility of yet another child that would grow up without a father.

  
Jaime noticed his cheeks were wet.

 

“GRRRrrlgraaaagh!” a new voice spoke up.

  
Jaime had a hard time to recognise undead Lady Stark in the flickering halo of a smoking torch.

  
_“Gods, what has become of her beauty? Of her being? If I have to die now... let it be a quick, clean thing, without a return as a monster like her!”_ he thought.

  
“Jaime Lannister,” a man translated at Lady Stoneheart's side. “I sentence you to death by hanging.”

  
“I have already been informed of my fate,” Jaime answered. “I take it you will hold to your promises better than me and to set Lady Brienne, Podrick Paine and Ser Hyle Hunt free?”

 

There was some grumbling among the Brotherhood Without Banners. Lady Stoneheart looked angry, but then, she gestured, and the man at her side said: “It shall be done after this here is over.”

  
Jaime nodded.

  
“Am I allowed to have a last piss and a last shit? I hate an undignified mess under the gallows.”

  
Jaime's captors became even angrier, and impatient, too, but he was allowed to relieve himself.

 

When he returned from behind a bush, a sling had already been thrown over a tree's heavy branch, and an old mare was standing underneath. For a moment, Jaime asked himself if Lord Stark had felt as detached from his body before his execution as he did.

  
Then, something else occurred to him.

  
He said to Lady Stoneheart's translator: “Please tell Lady Brienne the following: 'Kevan or Joanna, if necessary and if possible.' Can you do that? She'll know what I'm referring to.”

  
The man looked at the undead woman at his side. Lady Stoneheart shrugged.

  
“It shall be done,” the translator said.

 

When they led Jaime to the mare, he kept weeping in silence over all the moments he'd never have with his wench and over the grief that was ahead of her. He wasn't ashamed of his tears.

  
Lady Stoneheart made a gargling noise while the men were draping the sling around his neck.

  
“You seem to be a changed man,” came the translation.

  
“It's not for me to decide, but it may be true,” Jaime answered.

  
Lady Stoneheart spoke again, and this time, he thought he could understand her weird sounds: “I'm a changed woman, too. And you've done what you've done.”

 

Jaime nodded and found the time for a quick prayer to the gods, though he usually wasn't a pious man.

  
_“Better late than never,”_ he thought.

  
He remembered Brienne's wonderful blue eyes and the sweet sounds she had made when she had come under his hand, and he smiled warmly.

 

A man clapped the mare's back, so the horse cantered away from under Jaime.

  
There was a short, incredibly sharp pain when the rope tightened – and then nothing more.


End file.
